I know I have been silent lately, if there is anyoe still out there, but, that will hopefully soon change as this blog becomes my primary writing outlet.
Until then, I would like to go back in time and file a lawsuit against all the heterosexual literature, film, television and music I have been subjected to in my life. This suit will also be brought on behalf of those who have struggled with their sexual orientation because of the bombardment of the heterosexual lifestyle into
our daily lives. I mean if two kids who stumble upon a book in a public library can
be that damged, why can't I? Story
Saturday, April 21, 2007
Friday, April 13, 2007
Hate Speech and the Media
Recently, a number of celebrities have come under fire for their offensive speech. Some have used racially motivated hate filled slurs in the private sector, and others in more public forums. Most recently radio shock jock Imus, lost his job for a sexist and racist rant directed at a college basketball team. In each of these cases, a whole slew of apologies, press events and appearances with noted African-American community representatives (mostly Al Sharpton and Jessie Jackson). All these add up to one convoluted apology for their racist/sexist/classist/homophobic remarks. The media acknowledges the apology and the nation is free to move on until the next celebrity says something and the process is repeated.
During the time that the celebrity's tirade is in the headlines, the media and American public are outraged that the celebrity had the nerve to say what they did. Even in the apologies, most offenders apologize for "what they said" and if "their words caused pain or harm" to the people on the receiving end of their remarks. Without fail though, the original outrage, media attraction and subsequent apology all focus on the specific incidence of speech and not the cultural and deeper roots of racism that lie behind the speech. In effect, the speech is addressed but the attitude is rarely even acknowledged.
The focus on speech and not the deeper causes of the speech does two things. First, it reinforces the notion of political correctness which I believe allows most Americans to stand behind a veil of ignorance with plausible deniability that racism exists. The average person with white/male/Christian/heterosexual privilege, can say that the problem of racism has been taken care of because it's presence has been erased in the general consciousness of most Americans. If I don't see it, it doesn't exist.
Second, it creates an environment where only the most outrageous speech is acknowledge and addressed as racist. Media Matters has compiled a long list of equally offensive and more subtle racism in the media today. This list shows how sometimes racist comments are not as blatant as Imus and frankly, I think the more subtle the hate speech, the more dangerous.
I grew up in a family that had serious problems with race, I hate to say it but I think in certain members the problem persists today. I fear that I once repeated one of the most hurtful racist remarks to a teacher once, without even realizing that it was hate speech. I won't repeat it here, but suffice it to say, it was pretty horrible and I think it ruined that relationship with that particular teacher.
The point is, no one in my family would consider themselves to be racist. Largely because racism, in their view, is the KKK burning crosses on lawns, and not the more subtle racism that hides below the surface. Which to me, is even more dangerous than Imus and his rants, because they become a part of a cultural fabric, perpetuating racist ideologies and are seldom questioned.
I want to be careful and say that I believe that hate speech of any kind is dangerous, and I am glad that we live in a civil society which recognizes hate speech as a form of an -ism. However, if all focus is placed on outlandish speech, then we are at risk of not acknowledging the deeper roots of speech and the actual -ism at work. We have to acknowledge both the speech and the ideology behind it if we are to have any hope of creating a truly civil and healthy society.
Media Matters coverage here.
Another interesting take from Harvey Fierstein here.
During the time that the celebrity's tirade is in the headlines, the media and American public are outraged that the celebrity had the nerve to say what they did. Even in the apologies, most offenders apologize for "what they said" and if "their words caused pain or harm" to the people on the receiving end of their remarks. Without fail though, the original outrage, media attraction and subsequent apology all focus on the specific incidence of speech and not the cultural and deeper roots of racism that lie behind the speech. In effect, the speech is addressed but the attitude is rarely even acknowledged.
The focus on speech and not the deeper causes of the speech does two things. First, it reinforces the notion of political correctness which I believe allows most Americans to stand behind a veil of ignorance with plausible deniability that racism exists. The average person with white/male/Christian/heterosexual privilege, can say that the problem of racism has been taken care of because it's presence has been erased in the general consciousness of most Americans. If I don't see it, it doesn't exist.
Second, it creates an environment where only the most outrageous speech is acknowledge and addressed as racist. Media Matters has compiled a long list of equally offensive and more subtle racism in the media today. This list shows how sometimes racist comments are not as blatant as Imus and frankly, I think the more subtle the hate speech, the more dangerous.
I grew up in a family that had serious problems with race, I hate to say it but I think in certain members the problem persists today. I fear that I once repeated one of the most hurtful racist remarks to a teacher once, without even realizing that it was hate speech. I won't repeat it here, but suffice it to say, it was pretty horrible and I think it ruined that relationship with that particular teacher.
The point is, no one in my family would consider themselves to be racist. Largely because racism, in their view, is the KKK burning crosses on lawns, and not the more subtle racism that hides below the surface. Which to me, is even more dangerous than Imus and his rants, because they become a part of a cultural fabric, perpetuating racist ideologies and are seldom questioned.
I want to be careful and say that I believe that hate speech of any kind is dangerous, and I am glad that we live in a civil society which recognizes hate speech as a form of an -ism. However, if all focus is placed on outlandish speech, then we are at risk of not acknowledging the deeper roots of speech and the actual -ism at work. We have to acknowledge both the speech and the ideology behind it if we are to have any hope of creating a truly civil and healthy society.
Media Matters coverage here.
Another interesting take from Harvey Fierstein here.
Saturday, April 07, 2007
The Date Has Been Set
I have my official Honors defense date.... 07 May. This means my final draft has to be in to my committee by 23 April. May the Gods help me.
Sunday, April 01, 2007
Maybe Brian Kinney was right.
A recent article on 365gay.com got me thinking about the current state of the queer community. The article deals with the death of the gay village, specifically the Castro district in San Francisco. The Castro is considered by most to be the central queer community in the country and, at least according to this article, it is dying. What is happening in Castro, is happening in some degree in many large cities with a significant queer population.
As members of the queer community gain social acceptance, we are being brought into the fabric of “mainstream” society and the need to be in communities made up of people largely like us is dissipating. While it is obviously a good thing that we are making headway in terms of civil and social justice, is our progress a matter of integration or assimilation?
The conflict between maintaining cultural and individual identity is not new or exclusive to the queer community. Immigrants face the same conflict when coming into American culture in trying to decide how much of their native cultural identity to hold onto in their new homeland. When my grandparents came from Hungary after the failed 1956 Hungarian Revolution, they decided to keep as much of their cultural identity as possible. They did not Americanize their name and taught their children, and me, their native language.
While they chose to maintain a connection with the old country, many others did not. Some with difficult Hungarian names shortened or changed them so that they would be more pronounceable. They worked as hard as they could to learn English and when it came time to teach their American born children, they did not pass down the tradition of the Hungarian language. These families wanted to assimilate into the American culture and gain the acceptance of their American born neighbors, a new addition to the melting pot.
American culture is described almost exclusively as a melting pot, where individual identities were expected to meld into the whole. In the melting pot, different influences add to the overall taste, but individual identity is associated first and foremost with the mixture. When someone comes along and decides to keep their identity, it is seen by many to be a direct threat to the whole. The melting pot creates what is generally accepted as a mainstream and dominant culture. In the case of American culture, it is most commonly aligned with a white, heterosexual, predominantly male, Christian identity, which is seen as neutral. Anything other than this is abnormal and a threat to the greater culture. (read for an interesting take on the melting pot theory)
Instead of the melting pot, I would prefer to see the development of a culture where individual identities and cultures can be maintained while still coming together to form shared community. Individuality and social identity do not have to be mutually exclusive. I can be proud of my Hungarian and American heritage, without it being a threat to either. I can be proud of my queerness, without it being an insult or affront to those who don’t share my effectual orientation. I can be in a committed relationship, which may not fit every definition or characteristics of other’s relationships without it being a threat.
Brian Kinney rejected the idea of queer marriage, not as a rights issue but as an issue of assimilation. More and more people are coming to support the queer community, and I totally support that notion. But, I wonder, is the support conditional on “us” looking more like “them”? To take it one further, do they support all of the queer community including drag queens, leather daddies and bathhouses? If not, then do we have to give up these things in order to gain and win acceptance?
The queer community is not united, like any minority we are subject to internal hatred and struggles, which keep us from moving forward. There are many within the community who want to “whitewash” our heritage in hopes of gaining a greater acceptance to the society as a whole. The need to clean up our image often manifests in internal conflicts with the “less desirable” aspects of our community. Like it or not, we have a history and we can’t deny it, we have to embrace it, understand it and grow from it. We would not have the queer liberation movement if it weren’t for a few drag queens willing to stand up for themselves chanting:
'We are the Stonewall girls
We wear our hair in curls
We wear no underwear
We show our pubic hair...
We wear our dungarees
Above our nelly knees!'
In short, we should be proud of who we are, and our quest for liberation should not have to come at the abandonment of who we are. What the queer liberation movement should be fighting for is integration and not assimilation. If we are to gain liberty and acceptance as a default of assimilation, then we haven’t won anything at all. We’ve only changed ourselves to fit in, and that is unacceptable.
As members of the queer community gain social acceptance, we are being brought into the fabric of “mainstream” society and the need to be in communities made up of people largely like us is dissipating. While it is obviously a good thing that we are making headway in terms of civil and social justice, is our progress a matter of integration or assimilation?
The conflict between maintaining cultural and individual identity is not new or exclusive to the queer community. Immigrants face the same conflict when coming into American culture in trying to decide how much of their native cultural identity to hold onto in their new homeland. When my grandparents came from Hungary after the failed 1956 Hungarian Revolution, they decided to keep as much of their cultural identity as possible. They did not Americanize their name and taught their children, and me, their native language.
While they chose to maintain a connection with the old country, many others did not. Some with difficult Hungarian names shortened or changed them so that they would be more pronounceable. They worked as hard as they could to learn English and when it came time to teach their American born children, they did not pass down the tradition of the Hungarian language. These families wanted to assimilate into the American culture and gain the acceptance of their American born neighbors, a new addition to the melting pot.
American culture is described almost exclusively as a melting pot, where individual identities were expected to meld into the whole. In the melting pot, different influences add to the overall taste, but individual identity is associated first and foremost with the mixture. When someone comes along and decides to keep their identity, it is seen by many to be a direct threat to the whole. The melting pot creates what is generally accepted as a mainstream and dominant culture. In the case of American culture, it is most commonly aligned with a white, heterosexual, predominantly male, Christian identity, which is seen as neutral. Anything other than this is abnormal and a threat to the greater culture. (read for an interesting take on the melting pot theory)
Instead of the melting pot, I would prefer to see the development of a culture where individual identities and cultures can be maintained while still coming together to form shared community. Individuality and social identity do not have to be mutually exclusive. I can be proud of my Hungarian and American heritage, without it being a threat to either. I can be proud of my queerness, without it being an insult or affront to those who don’t share my effectual orientation. I can be in a committed relationship, which may not fit every definition or characteristics of other’s relationships without it being a threat.
Brian Kinney rejected the idea of queer marriage, not as a rights issue but as an issue of assimilation. More and more people are coming to support the queer community, and I totally support that notion. But, I wonder, is the support conditional on “us” looking more like “them”? To take it one further, do they support all of the queer community including drag queens, leather daddies and bathhouses? If not, then do we have to give up these things in order to gain and win acceptance?
The queer community is not united, like any minority we are subject to internal hatred and struggles, which keep us from moving forward. There are many within the community who want to “whitewash” our heritage in hopes of gaining a greater acceptance to the society as a whole. The need to clean up our image often manifests in internal conflicts with the “less desirable” aspects of our community. Like it or not, we have a history and we can’t deny it, we have to embrace it, understand it and grow from it. We would not have the queer liberation movement if it weren’t for a few drag queens willing to stand up for themselves chanting:
'We are the Stonewall girls
We wear our hair in curls
We wear no underwear
We show our pubic hair...
We wear our dungarees
Above our nelly knees!'
In short, we should be proud of who we are, and our quest for liberation should not have to come at the abandonment of who we are. What the queer liberation movement should be fighting for is integration and not assimilation. If we are to gain liberty and acceptance as a default of assimilation, then we haven’t won anything at all. We’ve only changed ourselves to fit in, and that is unacceptable.
Mea Culpa
Mea Culpa
In the past, I have been very hard on Christians and Christianity in my writings on this Blog. I realize that I too have a long way to go on the road to tolerance and realize that prejudice on any level, for any reason, isn’t valid. While I still fundamentally oppose the integration of government and religion, I recognize that people have the right to their own private ethics and opinions on any subject. I would not want anyone censoring or denying me the right to my spirituality and as such, I shouldn’t deny anyone else theirs.
I also want to take a moment to acknowledge those within the Christian community who have had the courage to do what so few others (in public and private life) have. In the past couple of years schisms have begun to form in almost every major Christian Religion over the treatment of Gays and Lesbians. In a time when civic leaders won’t stand up for the rights of the GLBT community, churches have stepped up to the plate and have risked everything for what they believe to be right. I for one, would like to publicly thank those leaders for their courage.
I will continue to take on those who I feel teach hatred and intolerance, but I will also try to recognize those who choose to not use the Bible as a weapon.
Inspired in part by this Craigslist Posting.
In the past, I have been very hard on Christians and Christianity in my writings on this Blog. I realize that I too have a long way to go on the road to tolerance and realize that prejudice on any level, for any reason, isn’t valid. While I still fundamentally oppose the integration of government and religion, I recognize that people have the right to their own private ethics and opinions on any subject. I would not want anyone censoring or denying me the right to my spirituality and as such, I shouldn’t deny anyone else theirs.
I also want to take a moment to acknowledge those within the Christian community who have had the courage to do what so few others (in public and private life) have. In the past couple of years schisms have begun to form in almost every major Christian Religion over the treatment of Gays and Lesbians. In a time when civic leaders won’t stand up for the rights of the GLBT community, churches have stepped up to the plate and have risked everything for what they believe to be right. I for one, would like to publicly thank those leaders for their courage.
I will continue to take on those who I feel teach hatred and intolerance, but I will also try to recognize those who choose to not use the Bible as a weapon.
Inspired in part by this Craigslist Posting.
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